Line offers more juice

Utility reveals $633M plan to ease downstate electricity shortages

Updated 6:57 pm, Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Albany

Iberdrola USA wants to build a $633 million underground transmission line that would carry 1,000 megawatts of electricity from the Albany area to downstate Ulster County.

Details of the project, which could be completed as early as 2016, were submitted to state regulators in response to efforts to increase power supply to downstate, especially if the Indian Point nuclear power plant is shut down in the next few years.

The 53-mile direct-current line will mostly be buried along the Thruway. It would start in New Scotland and end in Hurley, a town in the Catskills just west of Kingston.

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Iberdrola USA, the domestic arm of the Spanish utility Iberdrola, says it plans to file an official application for the line with the state Public Service Commission in August.

The company is the parent of New York State Electric and Gas, which has operations in the Capital Region and other parts of the state.

John Carroll, a spokesman for Iberdrola USA, said the choice of using an underground cable and the proposed route along utility and highway corridors will "minimize environmental impacts and to protect critical view sheds along the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains."

The project is called "Connect New York" and is smaller yet similar to an underground transmission direct-current line called the Champlain Hudson Express that is planned for a route that goes from Quebec to New York City.

One of New York state's biggest energy problems is getting electricity generated in upstate power plants to downstate areas, especially New York City.

The problem is that although there are enough power plants, the high-voltage transmission system that carries electricity across the state is inadequate.

In places like the Capital Region there are bottlenecks in which huge power losses occur, which drives up electricity prices, especially during hot weather.

The corridor between Albany and Dutchess counties is one of the three worst bottlenecks in the state.

State energy officials also are worried about the possible closure of the Indian Point nuclear power plant in Westchester County, which today provides 2,000 megawatts of power to New York City.

The idea is that a new 1,000-megawatt line from Albany to Hurley would free up enough upstate power for downstate use to alleviate concerns over an Indian Point closure.